OPEN ↠ FALSE GODS, GREAT DEMONS (OPEN LOG 1)

[faderifting]

WHO: Living Residents of the Horrible Future
WHAT: Ah ha ha ha stayin' alive, stayin' alive.
WHEN: ALTERNATE FUTURE, 1-15 Cloudreach 9:48
WHERE: Anywhere, but especially Orzammar
NOTES: This is the first open log for False Gods, Great Demons. Anything that happened prior to Cloudreach 9:48 should go on the flashback meme. Most members of the TTT and their friends in Kirkwall will be arriving in Orzammar on approximately Cloudreach 7. In the meantime, feel free to make your own adventures. If you want to blow up an bridge, assassinate an NPC of your own invention, steal supplies, or anything else--it's all yours, go for it!

SOUTHERN THEDAS is a wasteland. The Blight crawling across the Orleian countryside and into Ferelden leaves nothing alive in its wake, scarring the land like an insatiable fire until no birds sing and the only things that grows is the Red Lyrium that speckles cliff sides and crawls up dying trees until they look like rows of jagged bloody teeth. And where it's still green, where people can still survive, the atmosphere is nearly as stifling. Every city and settlement is watched over by a Venatori or trustworthy collaborator. Those who don't keep their heads down and their dissent a whisper may vanish without warning. They may take their whole families with them. There are flashes of hope--an assassinated lordling here, a village rousing itself to brief and doomed rebellion there--but for every man the Imperium loses, they seem to find two to take his place.

NORTHERN THEDAS is at war. The worst of it doesn't reach west into Tevinter or the Anderfels; the line between the Qunari and the Imperium is drawn straight through Antiva, with Nevarra and Rivain on either side quiet and calm as only lands under martial law can be. The Free Marches vary between complacency and rebellion, but the rebellious ones risk ruin--there are murmurs it won't be long before a whole city is made an example. A steady stream of desperate refugees is fleeing north to the Qun, but plenty are picked off and punished as traitors before they can cross into Qunari-controlled territory. Your best best for a clean escape are the pirates who still hold Llomerynn free from both sides of the conflict.

ORZAMMAR is the only kingdom in Thedas that looks much the same--and Kal-Sharok, but they're not accepting outsiders. The heavy doors at Orzammar's entrance are sealed and guarded, as much against the steady flow of refugees asking for help as against the Venatori. The refugees are turned away. There's no way to know who can be trusted, and even if there were, there's not food enough for people who can't fight. Orzammar Thaig is still the dwarves' home--though with stealing shrinking numbers and poor prospects, King Bhelen has been amenable to allowing casteless surfacers some leeway--but the once-abandoned Ortan Thaig is the Inquisition's. Quietly. The only things stopping a full assault on Orzammar is the Venatori's need for dwarf-mined lyrium and the plausible deniability that the Inquisition's remaining rebel bands are using the Deep Roads with Bhelen's consent.

An hour's walk through caves and deepstalker swarms, Ortan is a city in its own right. A crammed city, one where cots and bunk beds crammed into shared housing are the norm no matter how important someone is and you occasionally have to protect your dinner from a restless, swooping griffon, but one where you can still find a pint of ale or a game of cards if you've time to waste on them. It's just that not many people do. There's the watch to keep; the tunnels that creep further into the deep teem with darkspawn who are held back at barricades, while the hidden, narrow tunnels that lead to the surface are watched at all hours so anyone coming or going can be identified. There are weapons to forge and sharpen. Plans to make. Bands to lead. Maybe you weren't a leader five years ago, but these days, there aren't that many people with more than five years' experience still alive to give orders. Fewer every week.

And so we burned. We raised nations, we waged wars,
We dreamed up false gods, great demons
Who could cross the Veil into the waking world,
Turned our devotion upon them, and forgot you.
Threnodies 1:8

Comments

[doneisdone]

Teren has only the briefest opportunity to whip her head around and see who's shrieking at her before she's covered in Kaisa, and nearly loses her footing in her surprise and dismay at being hugged. "Maker-- Kaisa," she greets breathlessly, and gives her a customary little pat on the shoulder.

"--no parties. Nothing... so grand. I hope not to be here for long." She realizes what she's said, and winces. How to explain it without it sounding like she's just leaving again? "Maker willing, there'll be no reason to celebrate."

[unbrokenoath]

"What?" Kaisa pulls back from her, and there's a look of--hurt, disappointment. Confusion. She puts a step or two between them. Because, Andraste's ass, Teren, that really does sound bad, and her explanation doesn't clear much up.

"What do you mean, no reason to celebrate? Are you leaving again? Is anything happening to the others?" She stops before she can pelt Teren with more questions, and settles for crossing her arms. "There hasn't been much to celebrate for a while, really. You'd think this qualifies."

[doneisdone]

"No--" Teren begins, getting a sinking feeling as Kaisa steps back. Her too? She can't bloody win.
"I'm... yes, sort of. I don't intend to stay long." She rubs her temple, realizing how it sounds and yet not having the energy to dress it up. "There's been a giant cockup, and... well, the hope is none of us will be here much longer." She means that in the best possible way.

[unbrokenoath]

Kaisa, unlike Alistair, doesn't look angry or sullen. She mostly looks like a dog that had been denied getting pet. So sad. Doesn't it wring your heart, Teren. Well, it would if you had a heart.

"I don't understand." Well aware of the fact that she's not exactly a genius, Kaisa has found that adding time travel into the mix only makes things that much worse. "None of us--do you mean. All of us. Like. Not just your team, but the Wardens, too? Where are we going?" Maybe they discovered some new, better secret hideout? That'd be nice. She kinda missed the sun.

[doneisdone]

"All of us," Teren confirms, against her better judgment, and winces. "But mosty-- those of us who, ah. Have been gone. For a while." And who don't look a day older than when they left, which she hopes is some indication that she hasn't just buggered off to Nevarra for these past five years.
"We'll be going... back to Haven," she decides, since that's where they were picked up, where they will likely need to return in order to... do whatever. To go home. She has no idea how to approach this, and that's terrifying.

[unbrokenoath]

"Oh, well. There's a lot of those people, I guess." Alistair, Inessa, other Wardens that got captured. There's a reason why Kaisa stopped wearing the Warden armor. She's not afraid, she's just--cautious. She's had to learn to be.

"Haven? Ugh, but there's so much red lyrium there." She frowns, rubbing an eye. "It gives me a headache." It does worse than that, but she's not about to act like some weak loser, or anything. "But, I mean...I guess Tevinter will probably be avoiding it then. I mean, it'd not like they're immune, either."

[doneisdone]

Teren can't help but smile weakly, not for any actual gladness, but because she is, in a twisted way, relieved Kaisa won't have to deal with this for much longer. She'll see her on the other side. She hopes. ...if she makes it there.

"We'll have to find a way through it," she says, matter of factly.

[unbrokenoath]

The smile is misinterpreted, but maybe that's for the best. Instead, Kaisa puffs up a little, because Teren is clearly trusting in her abilities, and Kaisa has to prove that she's big and tough and not scared of a little weird red rock.

"Well, we've been managing around it so far. We've got like, tricks and stuff, you know? I bet we'll get there in no time at all." She pauses for a thoughtful moment, then brightens up. "You know, Bruce knows all about the red lyrium. He's been helping me with, uh." She gestures in the vague direction of her face. "That whole thing. If you want help, I bet he could do it."